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Controllers Say Machines At Airports Are Failing

Even though the Government has spent many millions of dollars to upgrade air traffic control equipment in the New York area, several controllers and technicians testified today that much of the indispensable electronics gear at airports and control centers in the region is aging and close to failure.

''Some of it's being held together with spit and gum,'' said Henry Brown, a representative of the Professional Airways Systems Specialists union. Noting that much of the equipment was 35 years old, he said: ''In some cases we have no spare parts left on the shelf and have to go shopping at Radio Shack. We need to update and repair our aging critical systems before anymore rubber meets the runway.''

Mr. Brown, whose union has long been at odds with the Federal Aviation Administration, was among several witnesses who testified today at a public hearing on Long Island held by Representative John J. Duncan, a Republican from Tennessee who is chairman of the House Transportation Subcommittee on Aviation. The hearing at the Holiday Inn near MacArthur Airport was called at the request of Representative Michael P. Forbes, a Republican whose district encompasses much of eastern Suffolk County.

''It seems each year in New York we are presented with evidence of something seriously wrong in our skies,'' Mr. Forbes said. ''Error rates are highest in the New York region, and the New York center that controls all flights entering New York airspace has an error rate over three times the national average. It's high time the Federal Aviation Administration responded.''

James Hevelone, the regional facilities manager for the F.A.A., said the agency was working to reduce the error rate, and he disputed Mr. Brown's contention about older equipment as a gross exaggeration. ''We have brought in a lot of new state-of-the-art equipment, and it's held together with modern materials and technology,'' he said.

Mr. Hevelone said that older equipment was carefully monitored and that 99.8 percent of it was operational at all times, and backed up by an adequate supply of redundant equipment.

In his testimony, Mr. Brown acknowledged that engineers and technicians did manage to keep the equipment running 99.8 percent of the time. ''But we have to work our people to death to do it,'' he said.

Air traffic controllers said at the hearing that efforts by the Government to train more controllers were falling far short of the number projected by Congress.

Thomas A. Monaghan, a representative of the National Air Traffic Controllers Association, which has battled the agency for two decades, noted that there had been ''an alarming increase in the number and severity of operational errors and near midair collisions'' at the metropolitan area's three major airports over the last two and a half years.

He said there had been one nonfatal accident, 11 near-collisions and approximately 22 less serious violations of F.A.A. rules, all due to controller errors, which he attributed to cuts in staff and lack of qualified replacements.

Frank Hatfield, the New York regional air traffic manager for the aviation agency, told the hearing that the number of controllers in the New York region had increased over the last two years from 218 to 340. However, he said that only 235 members of the staff were fully qualified.

Mr. Hatfield noted that the agency was preparing to install a vast new electronics software system, known as Standard Terminal Automation Replacement System, or Stars, to assist controllers across the country. This system is expected to cost more than $1 billion and take nearly two years to install.

Mr. Brown said that when the new equipment came on line, he feared that the Government would subcontract the repair and maintenance of the new technology to a private company in an effort to reduce the membership of his union.

''The F.A.A.'s objective should be the safety of the flying public, not breaking my union,'' he said.